Moments Left Too Late
by Reya Levith
Summary: The one situation Sherlock never expected to find himself in, despite everything. Post-Reichenbach, angst. Character-death. One-shot.


(A/N): I was very nearly crying while writing this. I am _still_ half-crying after watching the last 10 minutes. And reading marvelously bittersweet fanfictions. I am, somehow, enjoying this; I've never cried for a character in any story before (except for maybe Fred Weasley, and that was only a couple tears), and in a really twisted way, I am liking that this creation of Godtiss has reduced me to silent tears. Which, I do realize, makes me sound like Sherlock.

Don't own Sherlock. I seriously doubt I'd be able to handle the pure amazing.

And I know that this piece makes me sound very sadistic, but John's been through so much, I thought Sherlock deserved some stabs in the heart too. Don't sue; this is just my way of getting all the angst out.

As soon as Sherlock is through the door of his beloved home in 221B Baker Street, he knows-_feels_-that something is wrong.

True, he hasn't been anywhere near here in exactly three years, because his treacherous heart (that knows just how to hurt him, but keeps him sane at the same time) would never have let him leave if he had allowed himself to visit.

But now, now, he is finally done, all of Moriarty's clients are over (the ones that counted), lives-and careers-ended forever, after three long years, and he is finally home.

His stubbornly human heart aches with the tremendous emotion in it all, and just this once, he doesn't try to squash the feeling.

He can smell Mrs. Hudson's cookies. He can smell John's aftershave. But once he is through the door to the living room, he can tell something is wrong.

Horribly, irrevocably, painfully, wrong.

Sherlock stiffens. Perhaps he wasn't as thorough as he could have been-no. He had promised himself that for Lestrade, for Mrs. Hudson, for his God-sent gift John Watson, that he would not make a mistake like this. He couldn't.

No.

It isn't an intruder. Sherlock can see that now; no one has broken into the house, not even Mycroft and his idiotic 'grade three, active' government nonsense. There are no disturbances; everything is the way John would have obviously sorted it when he was finally able to, no foreign scent of another human being (except maybe Lestrade's aftershave from-earlier today?-most certainly), not even a break in the dust line around his skull (he was mildly surprised Mrs. Hudson had allowed that to stay there on the mantelpiece).

But something is wrong.

There is a _silence_.

Sherlock knows-senses-that this isn't normal. Silence was for him, just for him, to think, to reason, to indulge in his 'mind palace'. Silence would have no place here after his departure; his dear landlady and his best friend in the world would never have been able to stand it.

But there is no sound whatsoever, and Sherlock is plunging headlong into worry, his brilliant mind speeding out of control, spinning wildly in an attempt to avoid impact.

John should be home from his job. Should be.

Sherlock's breath heaves out of him as he scans the room feverishly. Then he is striding with his long-legged walk, compulsively, surveying the kitchen.

Nothing. No one.

His heart is pounding in fear, his mind is careening off the edge just like the way he had so confidently faked his death, he races out of the living room and up the stairs.

John's room.

No. God, good _God_, no. _Please_.

Up the stairs, two at time, three. His cloak billows around him, as agitated as he is, his scarf ends flying about in his haste. The tabloids would have said he looked crazed and possessed, a man with an obsession.

"John!"

His cry is anguished, involuntary, a desperate call for the one person that had been constant from day one to beyond forever.

His cry is a plea, a hope, a desire, devastatingly crushed beyond recognition in the next instant, when Sherlock takes in the scene before him.

"John..."

No longer a cry, this is a ghostlike whisper, full of suppressed pain and denial that his foolish, _foolish_ heart is throwing through him in waves, matching his cold mind thought for feeling.

He falls to his knees.

"No..." His heart bids him to say the word aloud, as if that would change the truth.

His bony hands reach towards John, trembling as if he was high, but no; this is more damaging, far more, than any drug-induced situation he will ever find himself in.

John Watson, army doctor, served in Afghanistan, flat mate of the infamous Sherlock Holmes.

Best friend of the infamous Sherlock Holmes.

Lying so peacefully, face-up, features of his face strong and determined, loyal and steadfast. Lying so peacefully in a small puddle of blood, very much dead.

Bullet through the head. His faithful revolver is beside him, a devoted pet. The last bullet it will ever fire at John's request imbedded in its owner.

His staring eyes are blue, with an unwavering gaze Sherlock knows well, even in death. But something behind that darkens the cerulean and even the coolly calculating high-functioning psychopath that is the only consulting detective in the world can identify it: heartbreaking, world-weary, sadness.

"John," Sherlock repeats, because for once his mind is whirling but isn't coming up with anything, especially not witty one-liners. In fact, his mind is being torn in two between cold reasoning and heart-shattering denial.

His hands are grasping John's, unknowingly feeling for a pulse.

There is none. His mind now takes that diamond-pointed arrow of proof and stabs it in Sherlock's willfully emotional heart, effectively shattering the fortress of denial.

Sherlock feels his heart being burnt alive, just like his nemesis had promised to do. But in the end, it wasn't Moriarty who had dealt the final blow.

He had only himself to blame for that, his too-smart-for-everyone self.

It is only later, when people he couldn't care less about knowing they existed come to take the body away, that Sherlock sees the note, printed words, but the four at the end written in chokingly familiar handwriting.

_Lost and insecure_

_You found me, you found me,_

_Lying on the floor_

_Surrounded, surrounded,_

_Why'd you have to wait_

_Where were you, where were you,_

_Just a little late_

_You found me, you found me._

_..._

_Early morning,_

_City breaks,_

_And I've been calling_

_For years and years and years and years and_

_You never left me no messages,_

_You never sent me no letters,_

_You got some kind of nerve_

_Taking all I was..._

Can't wait anymore.

~John.


End file.
